tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-23793530381896412082015-07-16T08:25:15.348-04:00Le Mot du CinephiliaqueMichaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.comBlogger977125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-36642511583122749982015-07-16T07:00:00.000-04:002015-07-16T07:00:01.423-04:00Vacation (1983)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a8/Vacation1983.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a8/Vacation1983.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Vacation</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Harold Ramis, 1983)</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The Griswold family's cross-country drive to the Walley World theme park proves to be much more arduous than they ever anticipated.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">For almost twenty years I’ve been watching year after year <i>Christmas Vacation</i> and saying to whomever that cares to listen that it is my favorite Christmas movie. But I have never seen the other movies of the franchise and even the original <i>Vacation</i>film that will have some kind of a remake this summer. Since this summer my wife and my daughter will embark on a car trip, not to Walley World but to Wildwood New Jersey, I had the urge to finally watch <i>Vacation</i> and see what it was all about. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Back in 1983, it had a huge box-office success and quickly became a cult classic. Still to this day I can’t figure why I haven’t seen this film on TV before. Clark Griswold (<b>Chevy Chase</b>) and his wife Ellen (<b>Beverly D’Angelo</b>) along their two kids Rusty (<b>Anthony Michael Hall</b>) and Audrey (<b>Dana Barron</b>) will go on a trip from Chicago to Los Angeles to the famous Walley World park, a ripoff of Disney Land. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Many moments of the <b>John Hughes</b> story are repeated in his <i>Christmas Vacation</i>and makes them like trademark jokes of the franchise. The infamous visit to cousin Eddie and Catherine will become stellar moments just like the pool scene with the girl in the red Ferrari. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The couple of Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo works well because Clark wants to be a good father, a good husband but he is so lefty and wants everything to be so damn perfect that everything is screwed up and she embarks on his mad ideas with a certain disdain but she loves her goofer husband so much that it reminds us of all of our dads and how we are as dads too. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The real genius behind the <i>Vacation</i> franchise is John Hughes and his writing makes it the best imperfect family. It reminds us how the road is half the fun and how the ups and downs makes it for great family memories. Sure it is reflecting a very late 1950’s idealized America but nostalgia and memories are hard to split at some point.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Overall, <i>Vacation</i> is a fun ride with the Griswold family and may or may not have influenced another well known American family&nbsp;: <i>The Simpsons</i>. I think that many elements link those families together and I wish that the Vacation series would be as everlasting as <i>The Simpsons</i> and maybe keep a level of quality that the cartoon did not achieved past a certain number of years.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-16054878564237193852015-06-30T12:00:00.000-04:002015-06-30T12:00:11.156-04:00The Wind Will Carry Us<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/84/The_Wind_Will_Carry_Us_poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/84/The_Wind_Will_Carry_Us_poster.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The Wind Will Carry Us</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Abbas Kiarostami, 1999)<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Irreverent city engineer Behzad comes to a rural village in Iran to keep vigil for a dying relative. In the meanwhile the film follows his efforts to fit in with the local community and how he changes his own attitudes as a result.<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">This poetic tale of contemplative scape is about a man returning to the source of humanity. In a rural village far away from Tehran, the man from the city has to learn to reconnect with the sufficient simple life of the people. <br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Director Abbas Kiarostami shots this film with long takes and camera movements so subtle that it takes its viewer as a part of the location. Kiarostami’s films have no real contexts and are told as if we were into the story. He doesn’t rely on much technique but he uses long scenes of genuine human interactions. <br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As we follow Behzad in his routine of taking calls with a cellphone that only works on a hill where is the cemetery of the village the many repetitions on <i>The Wind Will Carry Us</i> makes us wonder how life in small villages is not subjected to time and routine. Behzad learns to live into this particular mindset and felt under the charm of the life. Unlike his colleagues that are never shown, he gets to be a part of the ecosystem of the village and lives and breaths the location he is forced to stay.<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">His mission which is never clear, is to do a report on the dying of a old woman. Just like this is a clash for me as a North American, the culture of the village is a clash to Behzad and we are linked to his discovery. <br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">This is a film that sticks with its viewer for a long time and it is meditative without being arid or overly long. In fact, this might be one of Abbas Kiarostami’s masterpieces along with <i><a href="http://cinephiliaque.blogspot.ca/2013/11/close-up.html">Close-Up</a></i>. It is memorable and quite beautiful with warm colors and wide screen vast hills. One particular scene, which explains the title of the film is the milking of a cow in a dark cavern with a young woman and Behzad reciting a poem as a way to trade the milk for some knowledge. The trade is not an open trade but we feel that money is useless when you can have human exchange.<br /><br /><o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The Wind Will Carry Us</span></i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> proves again that Abbas Kiarostami is one the most important storyteller of contemporary films.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-91914141625944526562015-06-26T07:30:00.000-04:002015-06-26T07:30:00.965-04:00The Year 1968 in France’s Cinema<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/France_Flag_Map.svg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="313" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e4/France_Flag_Map.svg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">Note&nbsp;: this review is my contribution to the </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><a href="http://moviessilently.com/2015/05/18/announcement-the-classic-movie-history-project-blogathon-is-back/">Classic Movie History Project</a></span></span></i><i style="background-color: white; color: #123464; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;"><a href="http://moviessilently.com/2015/05/18/announcement-the-classic-movie-history-project-blogathon-is-back/">&nbsp;blogathon</a></span></i><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">&nbsp;hosted by <b>Movies Silently</b> &amp; <b>Silver Screenings</b></span></i><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">&nbsp;&amp;&nbsp;</span></i><i style="background-color: white; color: #123464; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;"><b><a href="http://silverscreenings.org/" style="color: #123464; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px; text-decoration: none;">O</a>nce Upon a Screen</b></span></i><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">.</span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Surfing on the recent successes of the now widely recognized French New Wave, <i>La nouvelle vague</i>, France was a burgeoning location for directors and auteurs. However, an event in May 1968 will change the face of its Cinema and break the greatest friendship of the New Wave. This essay will try to put some light on one of the defining element of the films to follow.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Of the most important films released in France in 1968 we can list <b>François Truffaut</b>’s <i>The Bride Wore Black</i>, <i>Les Biches</i> by <b>Claude Chabrol</b>, <b>Jean-Luc Godard</b>’s <i>Sympathy for the Devil</i> featuring The Rolling Stones, <i>Je t’aime, je t’aime</i> directed by <b>Alain Resnais</b>, <b>Maurice Pialat</b>’s debut film <i>L’enfance nue</i>, also from Chabrol <i>The Unfaithful Wife</i>, Truffaut’s second take in the Antoine Doinel cycle <i>Stolen Kisses</i>, and the porte-manteau film <i>Spirits of the Dead</i> co-directed by <b>Federico Fellini</b>, <b>Louis Malle</b> and <b>Roger Vadim</b>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As of 1968, two directors were the stars of the New Wave and France’s film industry&nbsp;: Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut. Friends from the time they were critics in <i>Les Cahiers du Cinéma</i> they each aligned a series of highly successful films. <o:p></o:p></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/2008/03/images/HambourgGodard.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/2008/03/images/HambourgGodard.jpg" height="211" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jean-Luc Godard</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">For Godard, 1968 was a turning point in his career that was already on the edge of a political &nbsp;metamorphosis. His films were filled with more and more revolutionary content. Just look at two of the films he released in 1967, <i>Week End</i> with obvious revolutionary slogans and <i>La chinoise</i> which was his allegiance&nbsp; to Maoism. Then in 1968 his film <i>Le Gai savoir</i>, banned by the French government, was about a couple listening to the radio and discussing politics. He also released <i>One Plus One</i> aka <i>Sympathy for the Devil</i>, a film of the creating process of The Rolling Stones while writing and recording the song <i>Sympathy for the Devil</i> interposed with Black Panthers speeches and images.&nbsp;</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br />Godard was more and more concerned by politics, Marxism, sociology, philosophy, and classic literature than ever. His constant struggle with stardom and the emptiness of the fame that accompany his success made him more concerned about how we should change the world and stop Americanization, Capitalism, consumerism, and reconsider everything and how everything was done. As he said of that era he was washed up from the common form of cinema.<o:p></o:p></span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/Fran%C3%A7ois_truffaut.jpg/220px-Fran%C3%A7ois_truffaut.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/Fran%C3%A7ois_truffaut.jpg/220px-Fran%C3%A7ois_truffaut.jpg" width="210" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">François Truffaut</td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">On the other end of this friendship, François Truffaut has become a classic filmmaker with a more and more conventional approach to filmmaking and acquaintance to the studio system. With <i>Stolen Kisses</i>, the second chapter of the Antoine Doinel series, the Jean-Pierre Léaud character that revealed Truffaut to the world with <i>The 400 Blows</i> in 1959, we have a Truffaut slowly falling into sentimental venues. His other release of 1968, <i>The Bride Wore Black</i>, is a story of revenge that was often compared to a proto precursor of Quentin Tarantino’s <i>Kill Bill</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Then came the events that provoked May 68 in France and the Langlois affair. The Langlois affair is about the way the French government decided to cut short the financing of the Cinémathèque and fire its director <b>Henri Langlois</b>. In support many international directors signed a letter for Langlois’ restitution to the French institution. Even if in late April, Langlois was reintegrated into his functions, the actions of the administration of President François Mitterand will lead to May 68 and bring the French people in the streets. Issues are about a huge social movement that won’t be summarized here. However, their effects will be reflected in the French cinema and the Godard-Truffaut friendship.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">For those who are not sure about the nature of this relationship, it would be easier to compare it to the Lennon-McCartney friendship. Once it was broken up, both parties started saying harsh things about the other. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Godard accused Truffaut of not being enough concerned by the revolts and being too close to the power to make sure to have financing. While Truffaut was more concerned about storytelling and technique Godard abandoned both to make documentary films and political contents. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">In a way, those events marked the end of the French New Wave. Well, any new wave must have a definite time table, this one even marked a long time and a superb evolution in French cinema. It’s influence will be palpable on many other New Waves but also in the New Hollywood. All in all, the year 1968 in France’s cinema might not be the most interesting in the quality of films released but marked an important shift from an emerging bunch of young and talented storytellers and those who will make a serious career out of it. Those who continued making films after this year have left a permanent mark in films.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-12157765227664677762015-06-22T06:30:00.000-04:002015-06-22T06:30:02.630-04:00One, Two, Three<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:OfficeDocumentSettings> <o:AllowPNG/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings></xml><![endif]--><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">Note&nbsp;: this review is my contribution to the&nbsp;</span></i><i style="background-color: white; color: #123464; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px; text-decoration: none;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;"><a href="http://aurorasginjoint.com/2015/06/01/announcement-the-billy-wilder-blogathon-2015/"><span style="font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">B</span></span>illy Wilder blogathon</a></span></i><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">&nbsp;hosted by Outspoken &amp; Freckled</span></i><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">&nbsp;&amp;&nbsp;</span></i><i style="background-color: white; color: #123464; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px; text-decoration: none;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;"><a href="http://silverscreenings.org/" style="background-color: white; color: #123464; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px; text-decoration: none;">O</a>nce Upon a Screen</span></i><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 15.3333320617676px;">.</span></i><br /><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:HyphenationZone>21</w:HyphenationZone> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>FR-CA</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <w:DontGrowAutofit/> <w:SplitPgBreakAndParaMark/> <w:EnableOpenTypeKerning/> <w:DontFlipMirrorIndents/> <w:OverrideTableStyleHps/> </w:Compatibility> <m:mathPr> <m:mathFont m:val="Cambria Math"/> <m:brkBin m:val="before"/> <m:brkBinSub m:val="--"/> <m:smallFrac m:val="off"/> <m:dispDef/> <m:lMargin m:val="0"/> <m:rMargin m:val="0"/> <m:defJc m:val="centerGroup"/> <m:wrapIndent m:val="1440"/> <m:intLim m:val="subSup"/> <m:naryLim m:val="undOvr"/> </m:mathPr></w:WordDocument></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState="false" DefUnhideWhenUsed="true" DefSemiHidden="true" DefQFormat="false" DefPriority="99" LatentStyleCount="267"> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="0" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Normal"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="heading 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 7"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 8"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="9" QFormat="true" Name="heading 9"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 7"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 8"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="toc 9"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="35" QFormat="true" Name="caption"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="10" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Title"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="1" Name="Default Paragraph Font"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="11" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Subtitle"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="22" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Strong"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="20" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Emphasis"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="59" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Table Grid"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Placeholder Text"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="1" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="No Spacing"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Revision"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="34" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="List Paragraph"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="29" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Quote"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="30" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Intense Quote"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 1"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 2"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 3"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 4"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 5"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Shading Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light List Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Light Grid Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="68" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 2 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="70" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Dark List Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful List Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 6"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="19" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Subtle Emphasis"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="21" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Intense Emphasis"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="31" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Subtle Reference"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="32" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Intense Reference"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="33" SemiHidden="false" UnhideWhenUsed="false" QFormat="true" Name="Book Title"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="37" Name="Bibliography"/> <w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Tableau Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-fareast-language:EN-US;} </style><![endif]--> <br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5IUw2-c10Jo/UtbNAzFBACI/AAAAAAAAFbg/Yb-2IhaEZgo/s1600/390px-One_two_three43.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5IUw2-c10Jo/UtbNAzFBACI/AAAAAAAAFbg/Yb-2IhaEZgo/s400/390px-One_two_three43.jpg" width="260" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Poster by Saul Bass</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">One, Two, Three</i> (Billy Wilder, 1961)</b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">C.R. "Mac" MacNamara (<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">James Cagney</b>) is a high-ranking executive in the Coca-Cola Company, assigned to West Berlin after a business fiasco a few years earlier in the Middle East (about which he is still bitter). Nevertheless, Mac is angling to become head of Western European Coca-Cola Operations, based in London. After working on an arrangement to introduce Coke into the Soviet Union, Mac receives a call from his boss, W.P. Hazeltine (<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Howard St. John</b>) in Atlanta. Scarlett Hazeltine (<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Pamela Tiffin</b>), the boss's hot-blooded but slightly dim 17-year-old socialite daughter, is coming to Berlin and Mac is assigned the unenviable task of taking care of this young whirlwind.</i></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Producer/director <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Billy Wilder</b> is mostly remembered for his comedies like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Some Like It Hot</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Apartment</i>, and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Seven Year Itch</i>. With <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">One, Two, Three</i> he once again goes into the comedic territory with lots of success. First, with his leading man James Cagney as Mac the ambitious executive of the Coca-Cola Company, by the way one of the most distinctive symbols of Capitalism, in the Berlin of the time they build the Berlin Wall. In fact, they were forced to leave Berlin for Munich to continue the shooting of the film because of the rising of the Wall. With his visions of expansion he has to deal with communists and Russians. With fast paced dialogues, Wilder wanted to make a funny film that would be like a whirlwind of jokes and strong moments. Much like, let’s say, Howard Hawks’ <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">His Girl Friday</i>.</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>One, Two, Three</i> is also the last film of actor James Cagney before his retirement and also one of his great performances. He carries the film on his own. He also represents the classic Hollywood in the early 1960's where the New Hollywood was about to take the silver screen and put aside those dusty stars and directors.&nbsp;</span><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Almost entirely shot into Mac’s office and some exteriors of Berlin and the airport, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">One, Two, Three</i>demonstrates how a strong script can set everything for a great comedy. Written by Wilder and<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> I.A.L. Diamond</b>, the plot is intelligent and is like a mix of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Ninotchka</i>, that Wilder co-wrote, and an Hungarian one act play by <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Ferenc Molnar</b>. It is truly a great use of the stereotypes of the time on the battle between the West and the East. Much like the battle between Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola; to use another figure that the film offers. One of the annoying things of this movie is the fact that the dialogues are so fast that they are almost yelled all along the picture. But much like any other screwball comedies it is almost an entire dispute the entire film that characterizes the genre. So yes they yell but every line is a pleasure and the delivery from Cagney, Pamela Tiffin, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Arlene Francis</b>, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Lilo Pulver</b>, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Horst Buchholz</b>, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Hanns Lothar</b>, and Howard St. John is deadpan funny. </span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">&nbsp;As often, heavy dramas gain respect and recognition and most of the time get the biggest awards. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">One, Two, Three</i> is no rest with that and Cagney could at least been nominated for his performance at the Oscars. However, this movie isn’t on many lists of great films and not even on AFI’s 100 Comedies. It leaves me wondering who makes those lists and on which standards do they make their picks because this is definitely an omission. One of the greatest lesser known films from Billy Wilder who often gets its impact diminished because he left a bigger mark as a master at comedies than in a more serious genre. A great comedy that I highly recommend.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nsa48wAu_kg/UtbNctA2--I/AAAAAAAAFbo/Dq8CQ2Ix_ig/s1600/index.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nsa48wAu_kg/UtbNctA2--I/AAAAAAAAFbo/Dq8CQ2Ix_ig/s1600/index.jpeg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-59193499719984297142015-06-12T07:56:00.001-04:002015-06-12T07:56:49.124-04:00Music Review : Akitsa – Grands Tyrans (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21875/homepage_large.473fce0f.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21875/homepage_large.473fce0f.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Akitsa – <i>Grands Tyrans</i> (2015, Hospital Productions)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">While opening with <i>Dévoilé</i> like most of the primitive black metal origins of the vein of early <b>Ulver</b> and <b>Darkthrone</b> the Montréal based band led by O.T. pushes its listener into a path that black metal territories have been visited for almost thirty years of lo-fi recordings, distant drumming, scratchy strident guitars, and desperate screams. While <i>Le feu de l’abîme</i> brings us into a Voivoïd dimension of vocals while keeping the musical standard of the recordings in the BM genre while the structure of the song slows down from the first title and visits a more heavy metal sound maybe like contemporary aforementioned DarkThrone. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">With its minimalist engraved black and with cover, <i>Grands Tyrans</i> goes one step into black metal and comes back just to dive again into its territory while never afraid to take the conventions of the genre into different angles and beat it with a cudgel just like it deserves to be with <i>Naufrage contemporain</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Even with a true Norwegian black metal sound, Akitsa seems to be able to indulge a Quebecois sound into their French lyrics and music. We feel that they have a progressive taste maybe undertake and it reflects into their crossing of the hermetic guidelines of the purist of the <i>kvlt</i>primitive sound of their contemporaries like <b>Taake</b>. Without surprise, fans of the genre are reluctant to Akitsa and the battle for a wider fanbase may be harder than other bands that stay into the mold but the victory of Akitsa will only be greater. The same can be said for the listener that will persevere and give many listens to this excellent album.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">8.4<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-22307404563995795732015-06-11T06:30:00.000-04:002015-06-11T06:30:03.350-04:00A Short Film About Killing<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/80/ShortFilmAboutKilling.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/80/ShortFilmAboutKilling.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">A Short Film About Killing</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> (Krzysztof Kieslowski, 1987)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: #F6F6F5; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The plot couldn't be simpler or its attack on capital punishment (and the act of killing in general) more direct - a senseless, violent, almost botched murder is followed by a cold, calculated, flawlessly performed execution (both killings shown in the most graphic detail imaginable), while the murderer's idealistic young defence lawyer ends up as an unwilling accessory to the judicial murder of his client.</span><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: #F6F6F5; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">A grey Poland of the late 1980’s is the setting of this longer part of <i>The Dekalog</i> that Kieslowski based on the Ten Commandments making a one hour film about each of the ten orders of God. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">We are following a young man (<b>Miroslav Baka</b>) who plans to murder a man (<b>Jan Tesarz</b>) for no apparent reason. With almost no dialogues, Kieslowski takes us on the journey to a cold blooded murder, the trial of the murderer and his execution. The most attaching character here is the young advocate brilliantly portrayed by <b>Krzysztof Globisz</b>. Humanity is in this sensible man and his compassion and culpability are vectors of our feelings of the whole film. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">It is a dark film that observe the worst in men, having to destroy someone’s life. Even if condemned to death penalty, killing a life is killing a life even if a judge gives a judgment. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Kieslowski’s films have their fans and his three Couleurs trilogy has earned lots of praise. I admire his work but I’m not a huge fan of his films. They are very claustrophobic and are not as interesting as let’s say another Polish director named Roman Polanski. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">I have not seen <i>The Dekalog</i> yet and I hope it will change my mind on the director, but I’m starting to believe that he is one of the overrated European director of the 1980’s; a decade where American films were categorized as too commercial and not as good as the American films of the 1970’s. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Maybe because I’ve been wanting to catch this film for such a long time or because I evolved as a cinephile and I am not a in such a dark mood anymore, but I think that <i>A Short Film About Killing</i> is interesting in some ways but at 84 minutes a film should not feel that long and extended with filling scenes that might not have helped the story to develop into a strong film.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-45386702882995812552015-06-10T12:00:00.000-04:002015-06-10T12:00:06.639-04:00Die Hard : With a Vengeance<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4c/Die_Hard_With_A_Vengance.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4c/Die_Hard_With_A_Vengance.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Note&nbsp;: this review is my contribution to the </span></i><a href="https://hqofk.wordpress.com/2015/03/18/announcing-the-beach-party-blogathon/"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Beach Party blogathon</span></i></a><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> hosted by </span></i><a href="https://hqofk.wordpress.com/"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Speakeasy</span></i></a><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> and </span></i><a href="http://silverscreenings.org/"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Silver Screenings</span></i></a><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></i></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Die Hard&nbsp;: With a Vengeance</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">(John McTiernan, 1995)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">John McClane and a Harlem store owner are targeted by German terrorist Simon Gruber in New York City, where he plans to rob the Federal Reserve Building.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This is the third instalment in the <i>Die Hard</i> franchise and my favorite one. Based on Hercules’ twelve labors and helped by Zeus (<b>Samuel L. Jackson</b>), John McClane (<b>Bruce Willis</b>) has to stop a terrorist in the biggest city of America; New York City. After the criminal bombs a commerce he plays a game of Simon says asking for McClane who is alcoholic and suspended to achieve every tasks he is asking him. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">With director <b>John McTiernan</b> back on board, <i>Die Hard&nbsp;: With a Vengeance</i> is a fun ride of action film sequences and mind games. Set during summer, the opening with The Lovin’ Spoonfull track <i>Summer in the City</i> gets us into the mood. Then Michael Kamen embarks us on a great soundtrack with a use of <i>When Johnny Comes Marching Home</i> that fills some of the best scenes of the film. Some bits of his score from the first two film are reused but they all blend together to get us on the edge of our seats.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">I remember going to the theater on May 19 1995 with two of my friends, I was eleven years old at the time and I was only one who haven’t seen the other films from the franchise. However, I was becoming a <i>Die Hard</i> fan. Even if the first film of the now five entries is by far the best and one of the best films of all time, <i>Die Hard&nbsp;: With a Vengeance</i> is my favorite one. The setting, my favorite city and almost my second home; New York City does do something in the whole. The fact that they did not visit tourist locations and included inside local places does it for a lot. It makes us feel as we know the city from the inside. It is a nice rally race that reminds us of the first NYC action films of the 1970’s like <i>The Taking of Pelham 123</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 115%;">All in all, he third instalment in the <i>Die Hard</i> franchise might not be as well praised as the first one but I wanted to highlight it as a summer blockbuster entertainment. And it is everything I’m looking for when I want to catch this kind of film. It has a dear place into my film lover memory and I tend to revisit it almost every year.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-83279139245640964812015-06-09T07:00:00.000-04:002015-06-10T12:05:00.331-04:00Entourage<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/Entourage_film_2015_poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/Entourage_film_2015_poster.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Entourage</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Doug Ellin, 2015)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Movie star Vincent Chase </span></i><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(<b>Adrian Grenier</b>)</span></i><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">, together with his boys Eric </span></i><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(<b>Kevin Connolly</b>)</span></i><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">, Turtle </span></i><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(<b>Jerry Ferrara</b>)</span></i><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">, and Johnny </span></i><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(<b>Kevin Dillon</b>)</span></i><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">, are back - and back in business with super agent-turned-studio head Ari Gold </span></i><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(<b>Jeremy Piven</b>) </span></i><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">on a risky project that will serve as Vince's directorial debut.</span></i><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">With eight seasons and 96 episodes the HBO series is now put onto the big screens which it displays its inside world of the emerging career of a young movie star from Queens to Hollywood and his three buddies tagged along. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">While HBO did the same formula with <i>Sex and the City</i>and released two films that were far from the original tone and feel of one of the most popular and cult series, with <i>Entourage</i>they however managed to keep the original episodic buddy humor and kept pretty much the same formula. What works for <i>Entourage</i>is the dialogues, the exuberant Ari, the ridiculous Drama, the always picking of the guys on each other and the times they have together. The storyline is an accessory and we couldn’t care less. What’s important here is to be with our old friends and have a good time whatever ever happens. At first, the film delivers considering those elements. Fans of the show won’t be disappointed because the characters are still true to them self and engaging. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">But, since we are in a film and not everyone has watched the show I believe that the story is weak and in a way not that important for the film. Just as the show was in some ways. Some of the film’s storyline are thin and the whole story of Eric doesn’t make any sense. At some point in the show it was one of the most important character and he is relegated with a bad writing decisions issue. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The real&nbsp;star of <i>Entourage</i> has always been Ari Gold with his legendary outbursts and anger management issues. Again he is true to himself and Piven is giving him the best he has.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Overall, <i>Entourage</i> is a nice return for the guys of the show but maybe not its best publicity. Definitely, I suggest that you watch the show before getting into the film. This might help getting some of the inside jokes and the whole mood of the story. For the fans its nice but not great and it even make us wish the show has never ended.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-50502742253001849312015-05-16T07:00:00.000-04:002015-05-16T07:00:04.640-04:00The Red Shoes <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b4/The_Red_Shoes_(1948_movie_poster).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b4/The_Red_Shoes_(1948_movie_poster).jpg" height="400" width="273" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Note&nbsp;: this review is my contribution to the blogathon <a href="http://www.classicfilmtvcafe.com/2015/03/a-blogathon-in-celebration-of-inaugural.html">My Favorite Classic Movie</a> hosted by Rick at&nbsp;<a href="http://www.classicfilmtvcafe.com/">Classic Film &amp; TV Café</a>.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The Red Shoes</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1948)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">A young ballet dancer is torn between the man she loves and her pursuit to become a prima ballerina.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As debatable as this affirmation can be, <i>The Red Shoes</i>is <b>The Archers</b>’ masterpiece. And I’m standing firmly on my position about this opinion. Even if they have a bunch of other outstanding films like <i>Black Narcissus</i>, <i>A Matter of Life and Death</i>, and <i>The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp</i>, the great dancing sequences and the superb composition of frames and the tremendous acting of <b>Moira Shearer</b> and <b>Anton Walbrook,</b> just to name those two, makes it one of the most re watchable movies of all time. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Previously, I wrote The Archers which is the name of the company of co-directors Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. Together they directed nineteen films and half of them are considered as classics and five of the whole lot are at some level masterpieces. We’ll however concentrate our attention on <i>The Red Shoes</i> and its qualities. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://s3.amazonaws.com/criterion-production/release_boxshots/2761-9ec513946cc1116f3849c6ccf0874e55/44_box_348x490_original.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/criterion-production/release_boxshots/2761-9ec513946cc1116f3849c6ccf0874e55/44_box_348x490_original.jpg" height="320" width="227" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">With its careful treatment by the <a href="http://www.criterion.com/">Criterion Collection</a>, cinephiles of today can watch it in a condition that is as good as at the time the film was released in 1948. On the question of his favorite film of all time, famous great director Martin Scorsese has often answered <i>The Red Shoes</i> and places it with Jean Renoir’s <i>The River</i> as the two best Technicolor films of all time. His admiration of the film is so strong that the sets and his signature in his film <i>New York, New York</i> are directly inspired by The Archers’ film.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Talking about <i>The Red Shoes</i>’ influence, you have Dario Argento’s masterpiece <i>Suspiria</i>that borrows the vivid colors and aesthetics of its dancing predecessor. Argento’s violent film also has a visual beauty in his Hitchcock horror. In the latest years, the Darren Aronofsky batshit crazy <i>Black Swan</i> film which the story is also about a female ballerina dancer has obviously been projected the crew to get some of the elements and feels. Especially the relationship between the dancer and the director is different but shows how strong this element can be in the life of a ballerina.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">It is a sumptuous film that Powell and Pressburger did in <i>The Red Shoes</i> and the production and the final are proving me right when I state, once again, that it is their masterpiece. It’s been ten years since the first time I watched <i>The Red Shoes</i> and I can vividly recall every scene from this first watch. Since then, it became a favorite of mine and this is why choose to pick this movie as my favorite classic film for the first National Classic Movie Day.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://quitecontinental.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/red-shoes-3.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="516" src="https://quitecontinental.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/red-shoes-3.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-67347974657794579912015-05-13T07:00:00.000-04:002015-05-13T07:00:01.162-04:00Starship Troopers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/Starship_Troopers_-_movie_poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/Starship_Troopers_-_movie_poster.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Note&nbsp;: This review is my contribution to the <a href="http://moviepreservation.blogspot.ca/2015/04/for-love-of-film-film-preservation.html">Film Preservation blogathon</a> hosted by Ferdy on Films, This Island Rod, and Wonders in the Dark. Please donate generously.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Starship Troopers</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Paul Verhoeven, 1997)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Humans in a fascistic, militaristic future do battle with giant alien bugs in a fight for survival.</span><o:p></o:p></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Over the years, the many films of Dutch film director Paul Verhoeven have passed the test of time and became cult films. Just think of <i>Robocop</i>, <i>Total Recall</i>, <i>Basic Instinct</i>, and <i>Showgirls</i> for his work in Hollywood and his early European productions are underground hits with strong sexual and violent images. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Starship Troopers</span></i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> is more a virulent critic of America, the use of medias, and the way action movies are representing a right wing perception of life. The story is accessory to Verhoeven’s message of second level one liners and overbearing violence. In the films of Verhoeven, violence is not really stylised or cool, it is in your face just like when Peter Weller dies in <i>Robocop</i> before being in the robot. Even in <i>Starship Troopers</i>, Verhoeven has a way to present violence that does not appeal even with all the saturated frames of blood and special effects. With a production of 105 millions of dollars, Verhoeven achieved a level of imitation of fascism and opulence that only Albert Speer’s architecture could have been compared to.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Many sequences are shot by shot exactly like Leni Riefenstahl’s <i>Triumph of the Will</i> documenting Nazi reunions of the German party. The irony and satiric tone of <i>Starship Troopers</i> makes it such a great piece of anthology that it is almost frightening to think that American ideologies are not that far from what the film represents.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Curiously, at the time <i>Starship Troopers</i> <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/11/-em-starship-troopers-em-one-of-the-most-misunderstood-movies-ever/281236/">was released</a>, the critics and the public were not that warm about the film. Probably not ready for such an examination of their foreign politics, the turning of the 21st Century with the sad and condemnable events of September 11 may have demonstrated to the face of the world America’s belligerent politics. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As a film enthusiast, or as I like to call myself a cinephile, I really enjoyed Starship Troopers for its second level of reading and how he uses the action sequences to demonstrate a point. They are also really entertaining and this is one of the best part of this film. It has both values that few films of the genre have. In fact, I like most of Verhoeven’s films and I would watch <i>Robocop</i>, <i>Total Recall</i>, or <i>Starship Troopers</i> anytime knowing that it will be a good time and that I will find a little detail I haven’t seen before. They have great watch value and it adds a little <i>omph</i> to the whole thing.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/1397805?code=Blogathon+2015"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--8O2iGh7ZEg/VSFvWrXWTaI/AAAAAAAAMAs/vV5hLj5s3HE/s1600/GortButton01B.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-92102631658152292122015-05-11T06:30:00.000-04:002015-05-11T06:30:03.690-04:00Music Review : Blur – The Magic Whip (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn3.pitchfork.com/albums/21807/homepage_large.bd67996a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn3.pitchfork.com/albums/21807/homepage_large.bd67996a.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Blur – <i>The Magic Whip</i> (2015, Parlophone)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Forever for mainstream music listeners Blur will be linked with their hit <i>Song 2</i> and for a few more their singer will be remembered as the mysterious voice behind Gorillaz. Blur’s new album, <i>The Magic Whip</i>, features twelve new songs of alternative rock that would not stay in the 1990’s just as their aforementioned hit. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">After many listens, <i>The Magic Whip</i> plays as an average album with certain highs and some lows. However, as the album goes the song <i>Ong Ong</i> will be my soundtrack for the summer and it is probably the most radio phonic song of the whole record. Not many hooks and a lot of filling titles in an album lacking real depth or, let’s say it like that, it needed more meat around the bone.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">6.1<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-17108697106059015382015-05-08T14:00:00.000-04:002015-05-08T14:01:11.034-04:00Music Review : Sufjan Stevens – Carrie & Lowell (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn3.pitchfork.com/albums/21486/homepage_large.dbfa1978.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn3.pitchfork.com/albums/21486/homepage_large.dbfa1978.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Sufjan Stevens – <i>Carrie &amp; Lowell </i>(2015, Asthmatic Kitty)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Carrie &amp; Lowell</span></i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> is my first experience with singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens and I must say his acoustic indie rock hooked me at the first listen. The melancholy and sadness of this record reminded me how the first records of The Weakerthans brought me into a place inside where those feelings are OK to be felt and even a little comfy. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Stevens writes about his late mother who died in 2012 on <i>Carrie &amp; Lowell</i>. Carrie is her and Lowell was his stepfather. Just as he writes «&nbsp;the past is still the past&nbsp;» on <i>Should Have Known Better</i>, he tries to accept and pass his mourning. In fact, this same song is maybe the happiest of the album with the «&nbsp;My brother had a daughter&nbsp;» when on the other songs he writes sometimes about suicide, blood, masturbation, and violence. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Songwriting may be something difficult but for others it is just as easy as breathing. The whole album seems like Stevens is breathing those lyrics and writes about his life and his inner feelings.&nbsp;</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br />Subtle touches of instruments are in the background of Sufjan’s guitar and his whisper of a voice. Making <i>Carrie &amp; Lowell</i> a minimalist jewel that unfolds slowly with every new listen. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">At first, Sufjan Stevens might not be the artist that I usually go towards but his Cat Stevenesque quality that also reminded me of George Harrison and a bit of Paul Simon. Strong songwriting and a few chords just to be with the simplistic yet efficient music.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">8.2<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-74289679668133374662015-05-04T07:00:00.000-04:002015-05-06T13:53:33.311-04:00Les maîtres fous (The Mad Masters)<div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Note&nbsp;: This review is my contribution to the </span></i><a href="http://moviessilently.com/2015/03/20/announcement-shorts-a-tiny-blogathon/"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Shorts!</span></i></a><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">blogathon hosted by </span></i><a href="http://www.moviessilently.com/"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Movies Silently</span></i></a><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> from May 2nd to the 4th of 2015.<b> </b>Please visit the links and enjoy the readings of the other great writers participating.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/68/Les_maitres_fous_title_still.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/68/Les_maitres_fous_title_still.jpg" height="300" width="400" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Les maîtres fous (The Mad Masters)</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> (Jean Rouch, 1955)</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="background: white; color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The effects of colonialism are exposed in this film on indigenous Africans via specific rituals developed as a reaction to the colonial system. The film turns into a crazy elaboration on both the madness of such a political system and man himself.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Banned in Niger and British territories like Ghana, Jean Rouch’s <i>Les maîtres fous</i> is a docufiction about ethnology and colonialism. Rouch was himself a well known ethnologist and developed the genre ethnofiction. At the time when Rouch directed and presented his film nations were about to get free from their masters. Movements of nationalism and liberation were budding all over the world. In 1958, Niger for example gained its Independence.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Les maîtres fous</span></i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> presents the sect of the Haukas that initiates its participants with possessions and representations of the behaviors of their masters. In a way they try to emulate the actions of their oppressors and simulate and expiate their sufferings. As they do this afterwards the Haukas are shown working with big smiles and happiness despite the poor condition of hard work. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z43/sevenarts/cinema/lesmaitresfous1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z43/sevenarts/cinema/lesmaitresfous1.jpg" height="293" width="400" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Another explanation of this tradition is an African interpretation of the rituals as it is a way to take their rivals power and eat it. For non-African people this interpretation seems difficult to understand but many rituals executed in Africa are old of hundreds, if not, thousands of years and are anchored deep into the collective mind of these people. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Jean Rouch with his docufiction seems to be exploiting a sensationalist behavior that gives a racist vision of colonialism. Well, let’s face it, colonialism was the act of Imperialist nations wanting to spread their culture and conquer the world with ideas, language, religion. It was also a way to get resources at almost no price with cheap labor. Sure racism has many masks but colonialism was one of them. Discarding the locals’ culture and imposing your own can’t be good for your politics and men. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">But Rouch wants to show the reaction of the locals after many years of colonialism in their home land. No surprise the film was banned; it depicted without any filter the direct effects of nations on the verge of their independence living under the leaders of imperialist nations and making benefits on the hard work and land of their locals.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As a film of 36 minutes, <i>Les maîtres fous</i> was less disturbing that I thought it would be. It is straight to the point and narrated by Rouch himself. What’s interesting with documentaries, in this case a sixty years old one, is that it is a document depicting a slice of history very specific to a part of the world where few documents are available since history was more an oral tradition than our academic interpretation of the discipline. It is important that such short films and documentaries are preserved for generations to come to understand the past and the variety of ethnicity.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z43/sevenarts/cinema/lesmaitresfous2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z43/sevenarts/cinema/lesmaitresfous2.jpg" height="293" width="400" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-11557480013419109702015-05-01T07:00:00.000-04:002015-05-01T07:00:11.604-04:00Music Review : Bell Witch – Four Phantoms (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21618/homepage_large.6bdc5e15.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21618/homepage_large.6bdc5e15.jpg" height="398" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Bell Witch – <i>Four Phantoms</i> (2015, Profound Lore)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Following their first effort of 2012, <i>Longing</i>, the funeral doom duo of Dylan Desmond on bass and Adrian Guerra on drums delivers one of the greatest piece of music of 2015 with <i>Four Phantoms</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Those four behemoth songs are spanned over an hour like a slow paced walk through the Fangorn Forest. Like the slow moving Ents, Bell Witch gets to the point with a precise yet almost minimalist sounds of loud restraint. Letting each other have their own moments and not stepping on each other’s toes, Desmond and Guerra form a nice symbiotic core that elevates their sound into more diverse territories like drone music. As the instrumental side of their music takes more depth we feel a maturity and a hatching in their song structures. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The album is immersing and takes us on a trip in a strange dark place. Just like the ballad in the aforementioned forest it’s meditative also like the Bell Witch myth, very haunting. The use of diverse vocals gives a nice texture to the different levels of sounds and slow-tempos. As often with doom or stoner records redundancy is the dragging element but here there is no redundancy in this whole hour of Bell Witch.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As I discovered lately Bell Witch’s <i>Longing</i>, the comparison with <i>Four Phantoms</i> is fresh and easy to do. Their new album might be ranked amongst the greatest albums of funeral doom of all time. With this new release the influences of Om, Sketicism, Esoteric, and many more are less perceivable and we feel we are in the presence of a genuine record from two masters at their craft.<o:p></o:p></span><br /><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><b>8.9</b></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-67213433397743332732015-04-30T08:00:00.000-04:002015-04-30T08:00:16.004-04:00Music Review : Raised Fist – From the North (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://epitaph.com/media/news/RF_FromTheNorth_front.jpg.630x0_q90.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://epitaph.com/media/news/RF_FromTheNorth_front.jpg.630x0_q90.jpg" height="320" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Raised Fist – <i>From the North</i> (2015, Epitaph Records)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Sweden’s hardcore punk titans of Raised Fist are back with another record titled <i>From the North</i> that could situate them geographically from the other popular hardcore acts. In the early 2000’s hardcore and metalcore genres had been emerging and gained a wide spread popularity until emo and all its sub genres took the stage. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Back with a more mature record Raised Fist shifted their almost metal sound of old school hardcore is slowed down to let to more rock tempos than the usual fast songs. It is also a more commercial shift of their music and their release on Epitaph Records might be one of the explanations for this. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">From the North is a solid effort and feels like a good album in the discography of Raised Fist. However, the evolution from <i>Sound of the Republic</i> has molded into more vast audiences and as a fan of their earlier releases it took me longer to get acquainted to <i>From the North</i>.&nbsp;<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><b>6.5</b></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-40055335247584341312015-04-29T07:00:00.000-04:002015-04-30T07:46:35.419-04:00Music Review : Caïna – Setter of Unseen Snares (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21536/homepage_large.e916f226.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21536/homepage_large.e916f226.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Caïna – <i>Setter of Unseen Snares</i> (2015, Broken Limbs)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The term one-man-band is well known in the black metal genre and Caïna is an essential representation of this form of metal and band from Manchester, UK. <i>Setter of Unseen Snares</i> is a short album inspired by Matthew McConaughey’s character in the hit television show <i>True Detectives</i>. Filled with a couple of samples of the monologues of the aforementioned character, <i>Setter of Unseen Snares</i> is not your typical one dimension black metal record. Playing with the boundaries of metalcore, dream pop/shoegaze, drone, and post-rock Andrew Curtis-Brignell makes a textured album of experimentation of satisfaction in its overall tenure. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The six songs are imbricated and form a massive ensemble of melancholy, brutality, and ugly beauty. Yes ugly beauty in its form of black metal vocals and shoegaze guitar. A sound popularized by Deafheaven and their masterpiece <i>Sunbather</i>, <i>Setter of Unseen Snares</i>is possibly one of the best metal albums and even one of the best albums of 2015. It brings us into dark places with simple compositions and essential brutality.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><b>8.7</b></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-26421098091609158222015-04-28T07:00:00.000-04:002015-04-28T07:00:04.001-04:00Music Review : Tribulation – The Children of the Night (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21596/homepage_large.fb842ed9.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21596/homepage_large.fb842ed9.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Tribulation – <i>The Children of the Night</i> (2015, Century Media)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Coming from Sweden, the black/death impersonating of progressive rock metal of Tribulation might be the next <a href="file:///E:/LMdC/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_(Swedish_band)">Ghost B.C.</a> but with greater depth the quartet brings aggressivity and hanger to a genre that seemed to be topped by Katatonia and the likes.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Sounding like a merge between <a href="file:///E:/LMdC/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khold">Khold</a> and the aforementioned <a href="file:///E:/LMdC/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katatonia">Katatonia</a>, Tribulation’s latest album never quite fells into a genre and gets places that keeps them away from patterns and formulas of anything they might have been followers. With an imagery taken from classic Silent Horror films such as <i>Nosferatu</i>, <i>Les Vampires</i>, and <i>Haxan,</i> <i>The Children of the Night</i> captures the spirit and mystery of those late night classics with a contemporary touch of nihilistic black entity.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">There’s a feeling of progressive rock in <i>The Children of the Night</i> and the melodic approach to this kind of doom metal revisits the roots of metal without being an enumeration of their influences and idols. In fact, the melodic aspect of their music could have doomed the quality of the record but it used in good doses and keeps its darkness. However, songs like <i>Stains of Horror</i> are making this record a must even if some other songs offered are reaching for broader audiences <i>The Children of the Night</i> is a critic and a crowd pleaser.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Having listened to it only a couple of times, I might say without a doubt that it grows on you and offers many layers of textures and sonorities. Very moody too even for such a melodic piece. <o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">8.2<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-75834419827224334272015-04-27T08:30:00.000-04:002015-04-28T09:44:31.276-04:00Come and See<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/27/ComeAndSeePoster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/27/ComeAndSeePoster.jpg" height="400" width="256" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Come and See</span></i></b><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">aka <i>Idi i smotri</i> (Elem Klimov, 1985)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">After finding an old rifle, a young boy joins the Soviet Army and experiences the horrors of World War II.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></i></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Often described as the most realistic War film ever made, <b>Elem Klimov</b>’s final film, <i>Come and See</i> is a <i>tour de force</i> of acting, cinematography, and human extremism exposition. This engaging film of beauty and ugliness of a teenage boy who lives through World War II in Belorussia and who is taken to fight along the Russians against the Nazi occupation and its extermination of those who are called the White Russians. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Midway into this nightmarish vision of one of the worst aspects of humanity in the 20th Century, War and the extermination of nations, I felt like if I was watching the ultimate horror movie. Knowing that this kind of story never ends well I tried not to get too attached to the characters but from the first moments I was hooked with the kids playing on the beach looking to play war during War. As young boys we imagined playing war was fun and wanted to shoot and live those action movie moments. However, Florian (<b>A. Kravchenko</b>) gets way more than he asked for. Not long after he finds an old rifle he is taken from his mother and two young sisters to fight with the Red Army. Just as he is we are the silent witness of the worst humans can do. What frightens the most with <i>Come and See</i> is how it is probably not exaggerated how the horrors and the cruelty is done. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Often, the main critic about War films is that it depicts an exciting vision of killing enemies and action movie of good and bad guys. By far, <i>Come and See</i> is the most efficient anti-War film ever made. I’ve read somewhere that compared to it <i>Apocalypse Now</i> is the ultimate date movie, well <i>Apocalypse Now</i> and <i>Full Metal Jacket</i> are rewatchable movies and have an entertainment value that can distance us from the horrible aspects and are mostly artistic visions of War from their directors. With Klimov’s film there’s a high cinematic value and he probably used some of the most manipulative and involving techniques to makes us feel the disgust of War but no one can stay passive with this film.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As much as the qualities of <i>Come and See</i> are obvious as it is depicting one of the worst nightmarish visions, we feel that the manipulation and the strings of sensationalism are a bit overwhelming. Some scenes are almost unwatchable and no one is spared. Just as the conclusion of the film evokes, History can’t be erased or reversed and sadly monsters like the Nazis have lived before and nothing can be done to correct that. It is a bit pedestrian or blockbuster label but <i>Come and See</i> fells into the mandatory film category and not for the faint of heart too. It reminds us of the U.N.’s statement after the Second World War of never again we must let this happen.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-2394694476177026982015-04-23T06:00:00.000-04:002015-04-28T10:30:22.137-04:00Music Review : The Mountain Goats – Beat the Champ (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21647/homepage_large.c73306d0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn2.pitchfork.com/albums/21647/homepage_large.c73306d0.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: The Mountain Goats – <i>Beat the Champ</i> (2015, Merge)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">With their indie rock infused with melancholy and a certain naive charm, The Mountain Goats released a new record based around wrestling and the ecosystem it is linked with. Scrumy basement rings and a respect for the discipline and entertainment it all represents. This subculture has inspired an album full of gratitude and connections with underground music and small recognition amongst peers and friends.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Adding piano, horns, and a certain depth into their songs, The Mountain Goats are pursuing the path of <i>Transcendental Youth</i>. With a touch of the Vince Guaraldi Trio recalling Charlie Brown on the song <i>Fire Editorial</i>, <i>Beat the Champ</i> is taking us in many territories that ask us to visit a myriad of sentiments and emotions.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As a record <i>Beat the Champ</i> might be more eclectic than its predecessor, but the variety of songs and the reach works well as a series of disconnected songs linked by a theme as surprising as wrestling.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">7.6<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-71217306267220297042015-04-22T06:30:00.000-04:002015-04-22T06:30:01.239-04:00Music Review : Lightning Bolt – Fantasy Empire (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cdn.pitchfork.com/albums/21440/homepage_large.7fb6b99c.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://cdn.pitchfork.com/albums/21440/homepage_large.7fb6b99c.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Lightning Bolt – <i>Fantasy Empire</i> (2015, Thrill Jockey)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The noise rock duo of Lightning Bolt has done it again for a seventh time with their new album <i>Fantasy Empire</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Playing with high intensity and fast tempos it is at first almost exhausting to listen to their music. With the subsequent listening, <i>Fantasy Empire</i> rises to another level and becomes more than just noise rock played with by ADD kids. It makes a coherent piece that elevates noise and rock together to a form that is not only an interesting experiment. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The drums of Brian Chippendale are fast and omnipresent as their snare kick are fulfilling the space and time of every song. On the other side, Brian Gibson’s bass guitar is heavy and crunchy. Chippendale’s vocals are tortuous and have an urgency few rock vocalists have achieved before.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Fantasy Empire</span></i><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> is one of the very good albums of the year since 2015 might be the year of noise as the rising genre of the year. Since last year was stoner the noise element is a logical evolution of music. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">7.9<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-31394006870143673332015-04-21T10:00:00.000-04:002015-04-21T10:00:02.341-04:00Music Review : Alambik – Utopie (2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.labelforrent.info/booking/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/ALAMBIK-UTOPIE-COVER-300x300px-150x150.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.labelforrent.info/booking/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/ALAMBIK-UTOPIE-COVER-300x300px-150x150.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Music Review&nbsp;: Alambik – <i>Utopie</i> (2015, Label For Rent)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Rising from the country of Portneuf near Quebec City, the four-piece Alambik has recently released their second album <i>Utopie</i>. Working with <b>Jef Fortin</b> of thrash metal band Anonymus, the production has a contemporary sound and a nice feel. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Sounding as heavy as Sick of It All at times and with a clear inspiration of Motörhead, Foo Fighters, Voïvod, and the 1990’s Californian punk rock scene, <i>Utopie</i> however doesn’t sound like a nostalgic piece of music. As diverse as their influence may seem the blend is nicely mixed and makes it for a uniform record that can easily stand as strong as the recent releases of Bad Religion. It is also obvious that the band makes music that they like and that they would listen. Then, you have a record made without compromise that reflects the talent and the interest of its musicians.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Overall, Alambik makes efficient music that carries the ideas and the memories of a particular genre. On the side of originality the album often feels like a recollection of some moments of songs that are known, cherished, and loved by the band. It will certainly please the fanbase of the band and gain some momentary radio playing time on commercial rock centered stations.&nbsp;</span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br />Will it be an album that will change the game of Punk Rock? I don’t think so but it carries its flag high, loud, and proud.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">7.1<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-90280469798312017362015-04-13T06:00:00.000-04:002015-04-13T06:00:07.320-04:00Analyzing Jack Torrance in Stanley Kubrick's The Shining For The Great Villain Blogathon<br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-clqZMcJaRIA/VSW-gPixMaI/AAAAAAAAGOA/pNp6iGDwyvw/s1600/JT5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-clqZMcJaRIA/VSW-gPixMaI/AAAAAAAAGOA/pNp6iGDwyvw/s1600/JT5.jpg" height="280" width="400" /></a></div></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Analyzing Jack Torrance in Stanley Kubrick’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Shining</i> For <a href="https://hqofk.wordpress.com/2015/02/18/great-villain-blogathon-2015/">The Great Villain Blogathon 2015</a></span></b></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As anyone who followed this blog for many years, you can easily guess that <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Stanley Kubrick</b> is my favorite movie director, it is also a given that </span><a href="http://cinephiliaque.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-shining.html"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><span style="color: blue;">The Shining</span></span></i></a><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> is my favorite film from his filmography (note&nbsp;: as favorite I don’t say that it is his greatest film, the answer to that topic might be <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">2001&nbsp;: A Space Odyssey</i>). When I got aware of this </span><a href="https://hqofk.wordpress.com/2015/02/18/great-villain-blogathon-2015/"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><span style="color: blue;">Blogathon</span></span></a><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">, I immediately wanted to write about Jack Torrance. Apart from the fact that I deeply love this film and that Stephen King hates it (note&nbsp;: King is one of my favorite contemporary author but I disagree with him on many subjects especially this one) I like the fact that Torrance is not completely a movie villain as the classic definition of the term would designate.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">First, a movie villain must impersonate an antagonist position with the hero of the story, he is the cause of evil or bad things happening to the hero. In <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Shining</i>, Torrance is at first presented as the central character and in some way he is the protagonist of the story. But he is also the father who brings his family to keep in order a closed resort during the winter. He is the bringer of evil since the Overlook Hotel is supposedly haunted. The last element stated as supposedly, the haunting of the hotel, is never really clear and depending on the reading of the film you choose to pick out, the spirits might be visions of Torrance’s mind. <o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0sK4X60o19g/VSW-eUfQ_3I/AAAAAAAAGNs/VVlbNBjIjio/s1600/JT2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0sK4X60o19g/VSW-eUfQ_3I/AAAAAAAAGNs/VVlbNBjIjio/s1600/JT2.jpg" height="180" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Since the family is isolated in the hotel Jack suffers of writer’s block, of a clear sexual repression from an unsatisfied need for encounter, and a severe need for alcohol. Sober for a long time, Torrance seems to be rekinkling with his old habits as long as the film evolves. Even taking part at an evening in the Golden Age ballroom drinking a bourbon in a room filled with ghosts. At this point, Jack’s implication with the hotel is more than just a job. He is possessed by the power of the hotel and he is given a mission to take care of his family just like Grady did before. Grady was his predecessor and murdered his twin girls with an axe in a bloody way. He was then promoted by the hotel as a permanent resident something Jack now seeks for his career.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">On some level, the character might be read as the evil counter part of Danny, his son who is gifted with the shining, deliberately bringing his young family to a resort where solitude and ennui is right at the corner. However, Jack is happy and seems to need to get there and take this job. His motivation is never really clear except from having some quiet time to finish his novel. From the beginning he seems to have a natural attirance towards this job and is fearless to do it.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Towards his job, we never see him actually taking care of the hotel or even his family. His wife, Wendy, takes care of all of this. She checks the furnace and plays with Danny while Jack tries to work on his novel. Most of the time he is wandering, throwing a ball to the wall and struggling to get words onto the paper.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">There are many facets of Jack that I think that can be linked to the author’s personality; Stephen King was a noticeable alcoholic in his early days and I’ve always read the novel <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Shining</i> as a play on a writer having to write through writer’s block. King often put teachers or writers as his protagonist’s occupations and this is one of his recurrent themes. An old master has said that you have to write about what you know. He sure put it to value giving Torrance both the writer and the teacher titles.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KpskQY541cs/VSW-d4GJ6ZI/AAAAAAAAGNk/ru0GDkR3wDc/s1600/JT3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-KpskQY541cs/VSW-d4GJ6ZI/AAAAAAAAGNk/ru0GDkR3wDc/s1600/JT3.jpg" height="245" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Jack Nicholson</span></b><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"> is in the role of Jack Torrance in one of his most famous characters with the legendary scene where he’s trying to open the locked door toilet door with an axe. The documentary by Viviane Kubrick, Stanley’s daughter, shows the preparation of<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>the actor for this highly intense scene. Nicholson seems to have no trouble getting into the right piece of mind to do those scenes while actress Shelley Duvall, who plays Wendy Torrance, struggled with Kubrick’s dictatorial directing. She often complained that Kubrick asked him to redo some scenes more than a hundred times. Following <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Shining</i> and also <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest</i>, Nicholson will often be asked to play over the top and his acting will be reduced to be a caricature of himself.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Let’s get back to our villain Jack Torrance, his job was to bring his family to keep the hotel from the possible degradation from the difficult winter elements. In the supernatural reading of the film, Jack was mandated to bring his super powered son to be a gift or an offering to the power of the hotel. <o:p></o:p></span></div><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kz5QeJvWEGs/VSW-fEHJh0I/AAAAAAAAGNw/Asvv_0JUuBY/s1600/JT1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-kz5QeJvWEGs/VSW-fEHJh0I/AAAAAAAAGNw/Asvv_0JUuBY/s1600/JT1.jpg" height="180" width="320" /></a><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">While another reading of the film is a Freudian one, which is probably more accurate when considering the many Freudian elements from Kubrick’s filmography, Jack the biological father of Danny must get Dick Halloran (the hotel’s chef and the man who exposes to Danny all about the shining) out of the way. Halloran is taking the role of Danny’s father figure because Jack is not a potent father figure. In Freudian words, a child who doesn’t feel that he is getting the right kind of fatherly love and strong father figure will try to get it from a more convenient and potent man. In this case, a man that understands him and that knows how to correctly protect him. One could add the Oedipus Rex complex to that where Wendy compensate for Jack’s lack of attention to his son and the child will get rid of his father to be the partner of his mother. A strong father figure has to be imposing a presence of the right kind of authority and indulge fear in his son’s mind that if he tries to get intimate with his mother his father will castrate his son.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">It is useless to say that Jack is a failure and at the end of the film he is tricked by his son when at the same time the sacrifice of Halloran helped Danny and his mother to save them from another horror at the Overlook.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">A great villain makes a great film and I personally think that Jack is a great villain with a complex construction and he is not easy to define but always interesting to observe and enjoy. <o:p></o:p></span><br /><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-r6gDkKNQHHs/VSW-f_63XKI/AAAAAAAAGN8/X25uyUX0-yY/s1600/JT4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-r6gDkKNQHHs/VSW-f_63XKI/AAAAAAAAGN8/X25uyUX0-yY/s1600/JT4.jpg" height="300" width="400" /></a></div><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;"><br /></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-36195830506242448082015-04-10T06:30:00.000-04:002015-04-16T09:26:15.869-04:00The Exterminating Angel <br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/26/Angelexterminadore.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/26/Angelexterminadore.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The Exterminating Angel</span></i></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Luis Buñuel, 1962)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The guests at an upper-class dinner party find themselves unable to leave.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Often described as the twin film to director <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Luis Buñuel</b>’s own <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Exterminating Angel</i> is a surrealist exercise of style and screenwriting. Again shot by long time collaborator to Buñuel, <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Gabriel Figueroa</b>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Exterminating Angel</i>is the story of a group of high class bourgeois that are invited at a dinner party after the opera. Strangely as the guests arrive to the mansion almost all of the domestics leave the house just like rats in a lost ship. Then with twenty seven various repetitions in the story the guests are isolating themselves in the house and have to live together in this island. Much like a play on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lord of the Flies</i> or an essay on Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s writings, Buñuel demonstrates how decorum and ethic codes are pompous and empty when humans are piled like a horde of dogs together.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">While playing on the edge of comedy, social commentary, and experimental cinema, Buñuel was a one of a kind storyteller. Even more with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Exterminating Angel</i> than with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Discreet Charm</i> he had to convince us of believing such a story and not make us blink with the repetitions. The first two repetitions are quite obvious with the two arrivals of the guests and the two toasts but as the story goes the subtlety of those is almost unperceptible. Just like the characters of his story, Buñuel wants to debilitate us from seeing with our conventional and conformist eye. <o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">In this social commentary by <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Exterminating Angel</i>, there’s a clear contempt of the upper-class and its ways. Presenting them as animals or even as wolves. It is clear that Buñuel couldn’t have made such movies some those themes under the Hays code in USA. By chance, Mexican backers believed in their director and left us a great heritage of unique films of great quality. <o:p></o:p></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-29462198738614937692015-04-09T06:00:00.000-04:002015-04-09T06:00:05.643-04:00Beau travail <br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Beau_Travail_poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Beau_Travail_poster.jpg" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">Beau travail</span></i></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">(Claire Denis, 1999)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">This film focuses on an ex-Foreign Legion officer as he recalls his once glorious life, leading troops in Africa.<o:p></o:p></span></i></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">This critically acclaimed film by <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Claire Denis</b> is a beautiful tale of manhood in the 20th Century. A century that was punctuated by wars and the evolution of the man in the society. Centered around the tensions between men, the relationships of power and envy, and the clash between the military service, the civil life, and the opposition of the rich world (France) and the poor world (Djibouti) <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beau travail</i> demonstrates with metaphoric and symbolism a simple story of the post-modern world.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The central character of Galoup (<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Denis Lavant</b>) is an interesting portrayal of a man in a position of power and submission. Leading a French Foreign troop in the deserts of Djibouti and directing a tough training feels isolated and even in those vast lands, a bit claustrophobic at times. A strong comparison comes to mind with a Spartan regiment of strong men musculated and often shown without a shirt. Their trainings are as gracious as dances and as demanding as a military exercise should be.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">The camera of <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Agnès Godard</b>, no relationship to Jean-Luc, is moving and creates a presence that involves the viewer. The editing proves to be particular and creates an ensemble of bits and moments of a fast but demanding lifestyle. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beau travail</i> is exhausting and also relaxing when its moments of contemplation are in full effect.<o:p></o:p></span></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0cm 0cm 10pt;"><span style="font-family: &quot;Arial&quot;,&quot;sans-serif&quot;;">As my second encounter with director Claire Denis, the first was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">35 rhums</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Beau travail</i> is as beautiful as it is meditative and the character of Galoup gives a great canvas for its highly talented actor Denis Lavant. Evocative of many European auteur films to come in the early 21st Century, Denis’ film was probably a revelation in its whole but especially its aesthetics. Godard’s camera as aforementioned gives a nervous signature to the film.<o:p></o:p></span></div>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2379353038189641208.post-92083098974296444732015-04-07T13:00:00.000-04:002015-04-07T13:09:01.189-04:00India Song<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-q5cMn1KB8T8/VR3frOG2jWI/AAAAAAAAGNQ/ftk8pjd4k8w/s1600/10.04.13_04.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-q5cMn1KB8T8/VR3frOG2jWI/AAAAAAAAGNQ/ftk8pjd4k8w/s1600/10.04.13_04.jpg" height="400" width="280" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b><i>India Song</i> (Marguerite Duras, 1975)</b></span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Poetical tale of Anne-Marie Stretter, the wife of a French diplomat in India in the 1930s. At 18 she had married a French colonial administrator and went with him on posting to Savannakhet, Laos.</i>&nbsp;</span></span><br /><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Visually stunning and populated with long shots of almost still life or still lives, <i>India Song</i>&nbsp;is rhythms only by its voice overs and the musical tracks. It plays as bits of a life of boredom into Asia that its screenwriter/director Marguerite Duras has probably took from her own experience in the Eastern World. It is also a piece of History that reminds the role of the Colonialism countries in the World. Just like the scenes in Francis Ford Coppola's <i>Apocalypse Now Redux</i> with the French living in Vietnam. They are a strange oddity of upper-class in such a poor and distant world.</span></span><br /><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>India Song</i> is the kind of film that gives lots of time and space for its viewer to think, contemplate, get immersed in the story. However, the contemplative element of the film reminds us of how a film can be that much slow and, in fact, almost standing still. As a self proclaimed film historian and movie critic, I had my share of slow and contemplative films but in this case there are few camera movements and long, long, did I mention long takes? Well, there are many long takes in this film. It is beautiful to look at and a lot of style in the way it is done.&nbsp;</span></span><br /><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But, it is so slow that it plays as watching a painting and reading a realist novel of the early last century. The composition of the frames must have been studied for weeks and just like Carl Th. Dreyer I'm sure every movement was synchronised and rehearsed. <i>India Song</i>, plays as a novel that was written to be felt by its words and filled with pretty pictures of grand compositions.</span></span><br /><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: #f6f6f5; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2px;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As a whole, <i>India Song</i> feels like a artsy film that brought a few number of viewers in and a fewer number out at the end. Has my first encounter with Marguerite Duras, I'm not sure if I'll ever get excited and jolly about seeing another of her films. Not that it was bad or anything but it was a demanding film that uses its own storytelling way and narratives.</span></span>Michaël Parenthttps://plus.google.com/113150078491129532807noreply@blogger.com0